As far as I know, the documentation for the existence of child/adolescent bipolar is still not quite there, and I have been unable to find any study suggesting diagnostic criteria for infant bipolar disorder. Even with some set of criteria, whether the disorder ought to be treated with the same meds as adult bipolar disorder is a separate issue, since 1) such meds may interfere with brain development and 2) early-onset disorders may be of an entirely different character from later disorders.

This is so unbelievable, it's beyond comprehension!!

Dearest Philip:

The more data that is compiled; the worse the news, and the uglier this picture gets. I just finished once again writing a piece on this very subject over @ http://bipolar-stanscroniclesandnarritive.blogspot.com/ (you must be drilling holes in my mind and implanting dubious thoughts LOL)
I still am trying to fathom the logic and rational behind the use of these powerful and dangerous medications on children. At first I'm just enraged and angry. Then I try to look for the reasoning behind this practice.
What are these doctors actually thinking? Is it all about the almighty buck no matter what harm they cause? Are these idiots somehow so brain washed by the medical model, under trained, or ignorant beyond all reasonable rational? Are these doctors actually buying into the pharmaceutical industry lies and misrepresentations so much that they are just blindly destroying our most precious of all resources, and the next generations of Americans. Where is the FDA when we are having a public health crisis going on within our very presence and for all to see?
These are the Questions I want answered?

Have we gone full circle back to the unregulated ignorance of the 1800's and early 1900's when opium snake oil was commonly used to control behavioral problems in children: the behavioral drug equivalent to the psychotropic tonics being marketed and used today. This is a serious problem for each and every mental health avocate and parent. we all must and should demand action on from our elected officials, the FDA, and hold the medical community responcible as a whole. We are in the process of abusing and destroying our most precious of all resources; the next generations of youth.
We all need to stand up and say enough is enough.I tried to tone it done a little here; on my blog I was a tad bit more verbose and not so PC.
Yours truly
Stan

Actually, the US census puts the 18-and-under population at close to 74 million - so if Healy's figure is right, the proportion of kids on antipsychotics is more like 3.4 percent. And rising?

Among other suspects: desperate parents, and the doctors of the children of desperate parents. Honestly, many of these kids probably do have severe emotional problems and behavioral problems which are intractable, disruptive, and painful for both them and their families. This isn't to justify what is going on - I agree that the onward march of APs is very disturbing - but maybe is one aspect of understanding it without demonizing everyone involved.

I agree with everything that stan has commented as well as having the same questions. Though I must say in regards to the use of opium as snake oil:
as a seasoned user of opiates, first expreince at age 6 for tonsilitis, then at age 9 for a very bad case of apendacitis which the recovery from lasted 6 weeks, and durring which time I was put on opiate medications for the pain (they had to remove my intestines from my body, wash them and remove dead parts, then put them back in, because my apendix had been allowed to "fester" for about 5 days), and so I did have to go thru the taper and WD process at a young age... plus having had plenty of teenage and adult experience with opiate medications AND psych medications since age 17 I have to say some things:
I would rather any day of the week and phase of my Bipolar Illness go thru the process of quitting an opiate versus any psych med I have had to quit - they have withdrawal syndromes that sometimes match or even beat a very bad opaiate withdrawal - And I honestly believe we would be doing these children less of a disservice if we were just giving them opium tinctures. Sure they could over dose, but it is certaintly just as possible to overdose a child with the types of extreemly strong sedatives that are being handed out today. And at least with Opium, you go thru withdrawal, or no withdrawal with proper tapering off the drug (kids under the age of 10 are VERY VERY unlikely to become addicted) but then it is over and done, you're off the drug and any damage it may have been causing, which was probably minimal toxicoligy wise because opiates are LESS toxic than a lot of psych med especialy things like antipsychotcs, well the "damage" goes away, reverses itself. But with antipsychotic drugs, if you developed diabieties due to them, if you developed TD and tics etc etc etc, you quit the drug and it doesn't go away - It's permanant damage....
... So in that respect I think what we are doing now is even worse than what we used to day befor the age of "psychotropics" when all we had access to were crude medicines like cocaine and opium . (PS - Ritalin works EXACTLY like cocaine in the brain, just to a very slightly weaker milligram for milligram strength in dose...Animals can not tell the difference between cociane and ritalin and some human tests have shown the same thing... yet we give it to children like candy whilst at the same time telling htem to say no to drugs - what a fuct up world we live in, no wonder kids do drugs anyways.)

And any doctor who is diagnosing a child as young as six months with a mental illness of any sort other than obvious retardation, should be taken out and shot in the knee cap, and then spend the next 20 years in prison. Sick, corrupt, ignorant know it all EVIL fools.

Garth,

How can an infant have emotional problems? I mean seriously, how can a person who is less than 90 days old exhibit a pattern of behavior? Perhaps my worst fears as a feminist have been realized, these are the unwanted children of women to stupid to understand how to use birth control and men to stupid to feel any connection to anything beyond a brief pleasurable twitch of their penises.

Sally

When parents are abusive, they will usually blame it on the behavior of the children they abuse. Apparently, there are many modern high-tech ways to do this. Doctors seem to be ever-willing to play along with the delusions of sick parents.

As to withdrawl symptoms, I have been off of psych-meds for just over a year, and I am still waking up in the morning with a racing heart-beat which tends to persist throughout the day. This was never the case before I took the meds. I read it can take up to two years to get over withdrawl symptoms and side-effects of these drugs.

Sarah Bosely who wrote the Guardian articles has been a woman after my own heart ever since I got into this "work". She was writing about the dangers of antidepressants even before the Panorama shows on Paxil. And I'm so glad you highlighted Sami Timimi's remark about the violation of children's rights with all this medicating that's going on. Children are being forced to take drugs by their parents and doctors and no one understands the long term effects on mental and physical health, but one thing's pretty obvious whatever those effects are they aren't good. Their whole lives are being impacted just to serve the "needs" of their parents, their schools, big pharma and psychiatry. They have no real voice. It's an abuse that's taking place on an enormous scale right now.

Sally, where did I say anything about "infants" having emotional or behavioral problems? From the context it should be clear that I was talking about under-18s in general. I also clearly said I was not condoning the use of anti-psychotics in this group - I'm deeply worried by that trend. I was just trying to offer an explanation for it that goes beyond just aiming at the most obvious targets: malevolent drug companies, greedy doctors, etc.

I don't know what you think you are proving by interpreting my comments ad absurdum. That's not an argument, that's not logic, that's just picking a fight for its own sake. (As for your last comment about birth control and penises... I won't even go there.)

Garth,

Sorry to offend. The blog was about among other things a 6 month old diagnosed with adhd. If a six month old is diagnosed adhd, I firmly believe the problem is that it's parents reproduced in the first place. It's just immoral to be so ignorant as to think a six month old has adhd. Desperation because an infant is difficult to care for is a tragic sign of ignorance.

I think we all can agree that diagnosing a baby with ADHD at six months (and bipolar disorder by age two), then pumping her with powerful meds is inhumane and grotesque. But if we're talking about children on meds in general, the majority of other stories are not likely to be so cut-and-dried.

This is absolutely horrific ..

The only reason i can think of as to why a psychiatrist would murder a baby with a combination of psychiatric drugs before the age of two is that this was a "drug test under the guise of a diagnosis"..

No crime that psychiatry has committed shocks me..
But this is truly beyond all rationality and is totally disgusting...

A well-written post. Agree with you. You can learn more on how to cure attention deficit disorder at www.attention-deficit-disorder.net. It may take quite some time to cure, but it's definitely a good try.

Really great post-- i'm glad you are drawing attention to this issue. I recently had a baby and I was not allowed to nurse while taking zoloft for panic disorder b/c the doctor said it would pass to the baby and effect his brain development. Now if a small amount of drugs passing through breast milk could effect a child, what do they think is gonna happen when they actually pump children full of this stuff????

Good point Amber, I mean if these same meds are warned against being used in mothers who are nursing, and in that case usually it is just a miniscule amount of the drug that gets passed thru breast milk, where is the reasoning to actually give the same drugs women are warned against, directly to these children?

You'd think if anyone group in the medical profession would stand up against what psychiatrists are doing it would be pediatricians. I wonder where they stand in all this?

Re: Zoloft

Dr.Daniel Carlat, psychiatrist and blog author says some SSRI's should be sold OTC[ over the counter]; and Zoloft is one of them.

I wrote about it at my blog with links to the conversation in his comment section where he stated these comments.

Dr.Daniel Carlat: SSRI's should be OTC.

Dr.Daniel Carlat: SSRI's: OTC: over the counter Anti-Depressants, part 2--lists some of the specific meds.

"No crime that psychiatry has committed shocks me..
But this is truly beyond all rationality and is totally disgusting..."
I second truthman30

I'm Brazilian and just found your blog.
This is a very good job!
Thank you for devoting your time on this scandal.
HEALTH

This was my first comment one year ago at Furious Seasons.

Thank you Philip.

"So a child was diagnosed with ADHD in the US at about six months of age? How? By whom? Based on what? How could a child that young be diagnosed with any psychiatric disorder? This simply makes no sense whatsoever.

Who the hell are these doctors making these diagnoses and writing these scripts?"
Philip Dawdy